The Council of Jamnia (presumably

Yavneh Yavne ( he, יַבְנֶה) or Yavneh is a city in the Central District of Israel. In many English translations of the Bible, it is known as Jabneh . During Greco-Roman times, it was known as Jamnia ( grc, Ἰαμνία ''Iamníā''; la, Iamnia) ...

in the

Holy Land The Holy Land; Arabic: or is an area roughly located between the Mediterranean Sea and the Eastern Bank of the Jordan River, traditionally synonymous both with the biblical Land of Israel and with the region of Palestine. The term "Holy ...

) was a council purportedly held late in the 1st century CE to finalize the

canon of the Hebrew Bible Canon or Canons may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Canon (fiction), the conceptual material accepted as official in a fictional universe by its fan base * Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture ** Western can ...

. It has also been hypothesized to be the occasion when the Jewish authorities decided to exclude believers in

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and relig ...

as the

Messiah In Abrahamic religions, a messiah or messias (; , ; , ; ) is a saviour or liberator of a group of people. The concepts of '' mashiach'', messianism, and of a Messianic Age originated in Judaism, and in the Hebrew Bible, in which a ''mashiach ...

from

synagogue A synagogue, ', 'house of assembly', or ', "house of prayer"; Yiddish: ''shul'', Ladino: or ' (from synagogue); or ', "community". sometimes referred to as shul, and interchangeably used with the word temple, is a Jewish house of wor ...

attendance, as referenced by interpretations of in the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chris ...

. The writing of the Birkat haMinim benediction is attributed to

Shmuel ha-Katan Shmuel ha-Katan (literally ''Samuel the Small'', or ''Samuel the Lesser'') was a Babylonian Jew considered a great early religious scholar. He was one of the second generation of Tannaim, who served under the patriarch Gamliel II of Yavneh, durin ...

at the supposed Council of Jamnia. The theory of a council of Jamnia that finalized the canon, first proposed by

Heinrich Graetz Heinrich Graetz (; 31 October 1817 – 7 September 1891) was amongst the first historians to write a comprehensive history of the Jewish people from a Jewish perspective. Born Tzvi Hirsch Graetz to a butcher family in Xions (now Książ Wielko ...

in 1871, was popular for much of the 20th century. However, it was increasingly questioned from the 1960s onward, and the theory has been largely discredited.

Background

The

Talmud The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law ('' halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the ce ...

relates that some time before the

destruction Destruction may refer to: Concepts * Destruktion, a term from the philosophy of Martin Heidegger * Destructive narcissism, a pathological form of narcissism * Self-destructive behaviour, a widely used phrase that ''conceptualises'' certain kind ...

of the

Second Temple The Second Temple (, , ), later known as Herod's Temple, was the reconstructed Temple in Jerusalem between and 70 CE. It replaced Solomon's Temple, which had been built at the same location in the United Kingdom of Israel before being inherited ...

in 70 AD, Rabbi

Yohanan ben Zakkai :''See Yohanan for more rabbis by this name''. Yohanan ben Zakkai ( he, יוֹחָנָן בֶּן זַכַּאי, ''Yōḥānān ben Zakkaʾy''; 1st century CE), sometimes abbreviated as Ribaz () for Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, was one of the Tan ...

relocated to the city of Yavneh, where he received permission from the

Romans Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

to found a school of ''

halakha ''Halakha'' (; he, הֲלָכָה, ), also transliterated as ''halacha'', ''halakhah'', and ''halocho'' ( ), is the collective body of Jewish religious laws which is derived from the written and Oral Torah. Halakha is based on biblical commandm ...

'' (Jewish religious law).

The theory

The

Mishnah The Mishnah or the Mishna (; he, מִשְׁנָה, "study by repetition", from the verb ''shanah'' , or "to study and review", also "secondary") is the first major written collection of the Jewish oral traditions which is known as the Oral Tor ...

, compiled at the end of the 2nd century, describes a debate over the status of some books of

Ketuvim The Ketuvim (; hbo, , Modern: ''Kəṯūvīm'', Tiberian: ''Kăṯūḇīm'' "writings") is the third and final section of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible), after Torah (instruction) and Nevi'im (prophets). In English translations of the Hebrew Bi ...

, and in particular over whether or not they . ''Yadaim'' 3:5 calls attention to a debate over Song of Songs and

Ecclesiastes Ecclesiastes (; hbo, קֹהֶלֶת, Qōheleṯ, grc, Ἐκκλησιαστής, Ekklēsiastēs) is one of the Ketuvim ("Writings") of the Hebrew Bible and part of the Wisdom literature of the Christian Old Testament. The title commonly us ...

. The '' Megillat Taanit'', in a discussion of days when fasting is prohibited but that are not noted in the Bible, mentions the holiday of

Purim Purim (; , ; see Name below) is a Jewish holiday which commemorates the saving of the Jewish people from Haman, an official of the Achaemenid Empire who was planning to have all of Persia's Jewish subjects killed, as recounted in the Book ...

. Based on these, and a few similar references,

concluded in 1871 that there had been a Council of Jamnia (or

Yavne Yavne ( he, יַבְנֶה) or Yavneh is a city in the Central District of Israel. In many English translations of the Bible, it is known as Jabneh . During Greco-Roman times, it was known as Jamnia ( grc, Ἰαμνία ''Iamníā''; la, Iamnia) ...

in Hebrew) which had decided the Jewish canon sometime in the late 1st century (c. 70–90).

Refutation

W. M. Christie was the first to dispute this popular theory in an article entitled "The Jamnia Period in Jewish History".

Jack P. Lewis Jack Pearl Lewis (March 13, 1919 – July 24, 2018) was an American Bible scholar affiliated with the Churches of Christ. He earned a Ph.D. in New Testament from Harvard University in 1953 and a Ph.D. in Old Testament from Hebrew Union College-Je ...

wrote a critique of the popular consensus entitled "What Do We Mean by Jabneh?". Sid Z. Leiman made an independent challenge for his University of Pennsylvania thesis published later as a book in 1976. Raymond E. Brown largely supported Lewis in his review published in the '' Jerome Biblical Commentary'' (also appears in the ''

New Jerome Biblical Commentary New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz Albums and EPs * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, ...

'' of 1990), as did Lewis' discussion of the topic in 1992's ''

Anchor Bible Dictionary The Anchor Bible Series, which consists of a commentary series, a Bible dictionary, and a reference library, is a scholarly and commercial co-venture which was begun in 1956, with the publication of individual volumes in the commentary series. O ...

''. Albert C. Sundberg Jr. summarized the crux of Lewis' argument as follows:

Jewish sources contain echoes of debate about biblical books but canonicity was not the issue and debate was not connected with Jabneh... Moreover, specific canonical discussion at Jabneh is attested only for Chronicles and Song of Songs. Both circulated prior to Jabneh. There was vigorous debate between Beth
Shammai Shammai (50 BCE – 30 CE, he, שַׁמַּאי, ''Šammaʾy'') was a Jewish scholar of the 1st century, and an important figure in Judaism's core work of rabbinic literature, the Mishnah. Shammai was the most eminent contemporary of Hill ...
and Beth Hillel over Chronicles and Song; Beth Hillel affirmed that both "defile the hands", the rabbinic principle (enunciated in Mishnah Yadayim 3:5) according to which the Holy Scripture is so holy that they impart uncleanness; writings that are not holy, do not impart uncleanness. One text does speak of official action at Jabneh. It gives a blanket statement that "all Holy Scripture defile the hands", and adds "on the day they made R. Eleazar b. Azariah head of the college, the Song of Songs and Koheleth (Ecclesiastes) both render the hands unclean" (M. Yadayim 3.5). Of the apocryphal books, only
Ben Sira Ben Sira also known as Shimon ben Yeshua ben Eliezer ben Sira (שמעון בן יהושע בן אליעזר בן סירא) or Yeshua Ben Sirach (), was a Hellenistic Jewish scribe, sage, and allegorist from Seleucid-controlled Jerusalem of th ...
is mentioned by name in rabbinic sources and it continued to be circulated, copied and cited. No book is ever mentioned in the sources as being excluded from the canon at Jabneh.

According to Lewis:

The concept of the Council of Jamnia is an hypothesis to explain the canonization of the
Writings Writing is a medium of human communication which involves the representation of a language through a system of physically inscribed, mechanically transferred, or digitally represented symbols. Writing systems do not themselves constitute ...
(the third division of the Hebrew Bible) resulting in the closing of the Hebrew canon. ...These ongoing debates suggest the paucity of evidence on which the hypothesis of the Council of Jamnia rests and raise the question whether it has not served its usefulness and should be relegated to the limbo of unestablished hypotheses. It should not be allowed to be considered a consensus established by mere repetition of assertion.

The 20th-century evangelical scholar

F. F. Bruce Frederick Fyvie Bruce (12 October 1910 – 11 September 1990), usually cited as F. F. Bruce, was a Scottish biblical scholar who supported the historical reliability of the New Testament. His first book, ''New Testament Documents: Are They ...

thought that it was "probably unwise to talk as if there were a Council or Synod of Jamnia which laid down the limits of the Old Testament canon." Other scholars have since joined in and today the theory is largely discredited. Some hold that the Hebrew canon was established during the

Hasmonean dynasty The Hasmonean dynasty (; he, ''Ḥašmōnaʾīm'') was a ruling dynasty of Judea and surrounding regions during classical antiquity, from BCE to 37 BCE. Between and BCE the dynasty ruled Judea semi-autonomously in the Seleucid Empire, a ...

(140–40 BCE).Philip R. Davies in ''The Canon Debate'', page 50: "With many other scholars, I conclude that the fixing of a canonical list was almost certainly the achievement of the Hasmonean dynasty."

References

Sources

* Kantor, Mattis, ''The Jewish timeline encyclopaedia: a year-by-year history from Creation to the present day'', Jason Aronson Inc., Northvale N.J., 1992

External links

Robert C. Newman, 'The Council of Jamnia and the Old Testament Canon' (1983)
an in-depth discussion of the subject on the site of the ''Interdisciplinary Biblical Research Institute''.

an interpretation of "The Council of Jamnia" presented on the website of ''The Catholic Treasure Chest''.
Jamina or ( Jabneh ) at JewishEncyclopedia.com

Jewish Encyclopedia: Academy of Jabneh

Jewish Encyclopedia: Birkat ha-Minim

Jewish Encyclopedia: Min

{{DEFAULTSORT:Council Of Jamnia 1st century in religion Jews and Judaism in the Roman Empire Judaism-related controversies Yavne History of the Hebrew Bible